The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1887-06-08
THE SHAKESPEARE MYTH.
Why Ignatius Donnelly Believes Bacon
Wrote shakespeare's Plays.

wrote Snakespeare'8 Rays.
[Ignatius Donnelly in North American Review
The traditions that have come down to
rs concerning Shakespeare do not, any Of
them, point TO the habits of a scholar or
gentleman. The first glimpse we have OF
the family was when John Shakespeare,
his father, was fined twelve pence, in 1862,
for maintaining "a conspicuous sterquina-
rum before his house in Henley street."
The first tradition we have con-
corning Shakespeare himself is that of an
ale-drinking contest with the "Bidford
topers," while yet young man, in which
be became so beastly drunk that he could
not reach home, but slept all night by the
road side. We are told that he was a deer
stealer and given to all manner of unlucki-
ness" and that "Sir Thomas Lucy had
him oft imprisoned and whipped" 3
The last tradition we have of him is that
bis death was the result of drinking bout
with Drayton and Ben Jonson. Neither
his fa' her nor mother could read or write,
and Halliwell Phillips doubts If Tiers was
book in the house Of his parents. There
is 10 reference to any book or papers in
Shakespeare's will His daughter Judith
signed her name with q cross. Imagine the
daughter of Herbert Spencer or William E.
Gladstone land the author of the plays was
than either of them) unable to read or
Shakespeare himself never claimed the
plays. He did not put his name on the
title-leaf OF any of them; for the name on
the title-leaf is in every case, civilian
Shakespeare" very often printed with a
byphen, thus, Shakespeare" while the
three signatures TO his will and the two
others to legal instruments, these being the
only autographs we have of him. are in
each case spelled Shakspere, which must
have been pronounced Shackspere. And
this seems to have been the accepted pro-
nunciatiOn in Stratford. In the records of
the Town Council the name of Shakspere's
father occurs 196 times, and in not one in
stance is it spelled Shakespeare. 1t is
given as Schacksper Shackesper, Shaksper,
Shaxpeare and Sharper. In "the poets
marriage bond it is ''Shagspere." >
Bacon's dearest friend, Sir Tobie Mat.
thew, was undoubtedly in his secret. Sir
| Tobie writes Bacon letter in acknowledge
ment of the gift of "a great and noble
TOKEN" presumed to be the Shakespeare
folio of 1928, and he adds this postscript:
The most prodigious wit that ever knew, OF
my nation and OF this side OF the sea, is Of your
lordship's name, though he be known by an
| other.
Bacon, in the sixth book of ''De Aug.
| mentis," says:
AS for writing, it is performed either by the
| common alphabet, which is used by everybody
| or by q secret and private one, agreed upon bY
partieu' ar persons, which they call ciphers.
| That is to say, cipher is a secret alpha.
bet. And We find Bacon corresponding
| with Sir Iobie, and referring to ''works oil
his recreation" and to works of the al
| phabet." And then, about the time
the Shakespeare folio of 1923, in which, be il
remembered, half the plays appear for the
first time, is about to be published, we find
Bacon writing to Sir Tobie that it is time
1 RI NDnt fha alnhahat N ~ Uhot
was the framef The folio-for l shall show
that the cipher depends on the paging o.
the folio, and the paging is as a frame tc
| the text.